Budget Cuts Slam State Schools

From the Star Ledger:

Rutgers hikes tuition and drops courses due to state aid cuts

Rutgers University will raise tuition 8 percent, eliminate 750 jobs and cut nearly 800 classes this year under the most dire budget in the school's recent history.

The Rutgers Board of Governors unanimously approved yesterday the $1.6 billion spending plan during a somber meeting on the New Brunswick campus. Board members and the university's president blamed the tuition hike and layoffs on a nearly $66 million cut in state funding from Trenton.
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Campus officials said the university's 50,000 students will be paying more money for fewer classes and services when they return in the fall. The elimination of hundreds of faculty positions and adjunct professors means courses and course sections will be cut and it may be impossible for some students to graduate on time.

Undergraduate tuition for New Jersey residents will increase by $587 to $7,923 a year. Out-of-state students will pay $16,428, a 10 percent hike. Graduate students will pay $478.50 a credit, a 10 percent increase.
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The board also approved increases in student fees, a 5.6 hike in housing costs and a 5 percent increase in dining plan rates. When all the bills are totaled, the average Rutgers in-state undergraduate living on campus will pay $19,000, or $1,201 more than last year.
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"Cutting aid to Rutgers and our state's higher education institutions is perhaps one of the most short-sighted public policy decisions made in generations in New Jersey," Baroni said.
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As a result, Rutgers officials said they were forced to make $50 million in cuts to every corner of the university's New Brunswick/Piscataway, Newark and Camden campuses. Under the new spending plan, everything from library hours to the printing of the course catalog and Division I sports teams will be cut. The salaries of senior administrators will be frozen.

The 750 campus job cuts will include the layoffs of 250 staff, faculty and teaching assistants and 400 part-time adjunct professors. Another 100 staff positions will be eliminated once employees leave or retire.